Spring Interlude

I'm on "spring" break for a week, basking on the hot sunny beaches of New York City...

Never having lived in a place with snow before, I never realized why people don't like it...Then I learned that snow is only fluffy and white and edible for a few days, before it refreezes and solidifies to impenetrable, slippery mounds of black toxic-looking contaminated ice. Fun.

Anyway, I haven't had much time for bloggage, but I'll be in D.C. in a couple days, visiting some people who have a lot more hands-on experience with the political world than I do. Until then, here's a few tidbits worth checking out...

1. China may be an unstoppable economic juggernaut today, but tomorrow is a different story. Among the clouds on the horizon: continuing water problems, financial bubbles helped by the fixed yuan, and increasingly angry poor people. Look for the Chinese speed demon to hit a speed bump in the next three years.

2. A high-profile hunter has been shunned by the NRA after he called assault rifles "terrorist rifles." He probably just means the AK-47. But the poor sod has given us a great buzzword. Everyone, start calling AK-47's "terrorist rifles" whenever the gun lobby suggest legalizing them!

3. Plenty of people are arguing over what it really means to be an economic liberal. The Nation argues that liberals shouldn't get too hung up on free trade and balanced budgets. But the conservatives over at Real Clear Politics point out that the (only?) obvious alternative would be to go back to ideas of price fixing, deficit spending, and protectionism. I agree with both, to a certain extent. It's a short hop from saying "let's support something other than FTAs" to saying "FTAs are the root of our problems, let's raise tariffs." But I also agree with the folks at The Nation, who say that new approaches are needed, like a government agency to promote U.S. exports and help close the trade gap (similar to Japan't export-promotion agency, JETRO).

4. Horse-race politics update: Obama continues to do well, but that might be because he's a fresh face; I'm optimistic, but I think we'll have to wait for the primaries to really test his mettle. Meanwhile, the better-known John McCain is tanking, as I always knew he wound. The man has a serious case of foot-in-mouth disease, and has a vengeful, sour attitude that makes him a bad national candidate.

5. Bill Gates can't seem to convince customers that he's cool, or make a Windows OS that doesn't crash. But he can sure write a damn good article about education policy. His big ideas, like Microsoft products, are solid but unoriginal: more H1-B visas for smart foreigners to come here, more incentives for them (and foreign grad students) to stay and become Americans, better math and science in our schools. I agree totally.

6. Steve Jobs - the Rolling Stones to Bill Gates' Beatles - also made news recently with his education policy views. Specifically, he said we need to be able to fire bad teachers, and blasted teachers' unions for blocking this reform. As usual, Jobs is both more controversial and more to-the-point than Gates. And while I think he's right - tenure makes sense for research professrs but not teachers - I don't think teacher tenure is as big a problem as seniority-based pay. Seniority-based teacher salaries remove any incentive for innovation, improvement, and quality, even as they deter smart young people from becoming teachers. Professors earn merit pay, and we have the best profs in the world. In fact, I'd say merit pay is much more important than either overall pay boosts or hiring/firing.

Anyway, there are a few tidbits to get your sociopolitical jaws chewing...more soon from D.C.!